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kellan_the_tabby) wrote2024-11-01 04:49 pm
small beauties: tiny things at the park
[ A bright yellow, ovate leaf sits on bright green grass. Half of it is laying flat, mostly shaded; the other half sits nearly vertical, sun shining through a few small brown-edged gaps. ]
Fall is so beautiful in town here. The cottonwoods in the park go bright yellow (as do the aspens throughout town), but the grass stays green until we’ve had a few good hard freezes. I couldn’t resist taking a bunch of leaf pictures — far more than wound up in this post.
[ Another cottonwood leaf, this one with far more brown spots in the yellow, with wider gaps in between. An entirely brown leaf sits in the grass next to it. ]
The whole time I was farting around with my camera, of course, Loiosh was being a wigglebutt. Why was I crawling around in the grass, he wanted to know, instead of petting him? Why?
Cats. They do not see the beauty in fallen leaves.
[ A close view of an entirely brown leaf. About half of it is shaded, and each tiny vein and darker brown spot is clearly visible. ]
Nor do they understand the joy of creating art, but that was later that day.
In the meantime? More leaf.
[ A green, elliptically shaped leaf buried in the grass. ]
The plaintain was all still green — I need to bring a spade & grab a couple next summer so I can plant them at home & see how they do, but for now, I’ll just enjoy the fact that they’re right there in the park. Free medicine!
Speaking of free medicine …
[ The fluffy white head of a dandelion. The long, narrow, dark brown seeds are visible through the fluff; the stem is reddish-brown. ]
I used to harvest all the dandelion & plantain leaves that went into the bite, sting & rash salve, & someday I hope to be able to do that again. In the meantime, at least they’re THERE.
Is this mushroom medicine? Is it food? I do not know! I don’t mess with mushrooms unless they come from the grocery store. Actually I don’t mess with them at all, I’m not terribly fond of the texture. But they’re pretty!
[ A small, white, round mushroom lies buried in the grass. It has a neato kinda bumpy texture. ]
I’d probably have come home with a couple decent squirrel pics, too, but alas, they take Loiosh far more seriously than I feel they really need to. I get their point, though, you never know when you’re gonna get eaten by a cat.
originally posted on Patreon; support me over there to see posts a week early!
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If you like the flavor of mushrooms and would like to have that without the texture, you can pulverize dried ones and use the powder in soups, stews, glops, and anything else you mix dry ingredients into before cooking. I buy bottles of the powder from Echo Hill, which is great, because another easy low-note tool in my low-sodium flavor arsenal.
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Be sure to do it on a day when you're feeling particularly brave and curious and everything around you is less annoying!
Also, I feel I need to state explicitly that I'm not intending to push you into doing this; I'm just throwing out ideas to consider for however long it takes to decide whether any of them is actually worth trying. Because I'll tell you right here and now, there is nothing on earth anyone could tell me that would induce me to try a ripe banana again, and by extension I've been on the fence about trying plantains for more than thirty years, so I get it!
Another couple of options I've thought of for getting the flavor without the texture: • I keep forgetting mushroom broth is a thing, but it should be stupid easy to make. • Because mushrooms shrink down a lot (not as much as spinach, but then, nothing shrinks as much as spinach!), if you chop them up finely enough, the bits might not be big enough to provide noticeable ooky texture after cooking.
Also also also, if you do try any of these methods, be sure to use fresh, new mushrooms, because the flavor can get a bit rank when they get old.
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